IKEA Richmond

The new IKEA Richmond opens tomorrow!

I had the chance to check out the new space (conveniently located next to their previous Richmond location) and was thoroughly impressed.

Not only was the media event excellent, but the sheer size of the store was insane. The old Richmond IKEA was 201,285 ft^2; the new one practically dwarfs that, coming in at a colossal 334,004 ft^2! What I found to be particularly interesting about this, is that the old store was only able to showcase approximately 3,000-4,000 of the items that were in stock/in the catalogue. However, the actual IKEA stock clocked in nearly 10,000 items.

IKEA Canada has been one of the leaders of greening business in Canada, having been named one of the country's Greenest Employers 3 years in a row by Mediacorp. In fact, if you think about it, IKEA was actually the first Canadian retailer to stop the use of plastic bags.

Some other neat sustainable facts about the new Richmond location:

• it is 40% more efficient than the last round of stores that were built in the early 2000s (I'm looking at you Coquitlam)
• it has 'parking'spaces for 100 bikes, as opposed to the 12 at the old location
• they will be using environmentally friendly cleaning solvents and other products
• there will be improved waste/recycling throughout the entire property

If you head to IKEA Richmond tomorrow, there are some sweet deals!